


Could Have Guessed

by mydickisthealpha



Series: I Won't Blame You [3]
Category: Teen Wolf (TV)
Genre: Angst, BAMF!Stiles, Drabble Collection, Fluff, M/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2013-02-27
Updated: 2013-02-27
Packaged: 2017-12-03 20:28:26
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,795
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/702323
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/mydickisthealpha/pseuds/mydickisthealpha
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Stiles’ mother had wanted to travel, and Stiles needed to get away. He’d already been down that road with Lydia, the one that was twisted, with snarled thorns catching the vulnerable pieces of skin he left bare. They were still bleeding, they always would be, and Derek… wasn’t a good idea. Stiles had a fear and an opening, and he grabbed at his chance before he could become courageous.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Could Have Guessed

**Author's Note:**

> This request was for a drabble inspired by the song 'Could Have Guessed' by Girlyman.

Stiles’ mother had wanted to travel, and Stiles needed to get away. He’d already been down that road with Lydia, the one that was twisted, with snarled thorns catching the vulnerable pieces of skin he left bare. They were still bleeding, they always would be, and Derek… wasn’t a good idea. Stiles had a fear and an opening, and he grabbed at his chance before he could become courageous. 

He hugged his father goodbye with a large grin on his face, let the Sheriff lecture to him the same things he’d already said at home and on the drive over. When the airport announced his flight, he left Beacon Hills with a good amount of money, his mother’s diary, a small bit of clothes, and his own copy of his bestiary and herb catalogue. 

He began in France, went to the Eiffel Tower just because. He drank in the libraries, reveled in the business of the people, and laughed loudly as he tried to learn the language. He visited old castles that he took pictures of for his mother and his dad. He ate long meals with strangers and kissed their cheeks in greeting, and learned that if you were kind to people, they were more often kind to you. Just as he was curious, so were others. 

Of course he ran into trouble. They were a small pack, and said they smelled the wolf on him, though he was but human. He trapped them in a mountain ash circle. They were fascinated by him, and he was fascinated by them. He let them out and they offered to let him run with them. 

“For a while,” he agreed. 

Being with them was a lot different from being in the pack at home. For one, these wolves were all born werewolves and had no trouble expressing themselves, walking around naked as any babe when they felt like it, and always smiled broadly. They also traveled all throughout the area, and were friendly with other packs in a way Stiles envied for his own pack. They taught him many things. How to hunt in the rolling hills, how to cook really yummy French cuisine, and how to appreciate the beauty of the wolf and a nice beach lined with imposing cliff faces. Hunters, despite having started in France, seemed to be no problem. He met their equivalent of Deaton, showed him his herb catalogue and the older man laughed and took him out into the wild to point out things that Stiles clipped and placed in plastic vials.

He thanked them when he left them, and they invited him back whenever he wanted. 

From there it got harder. The longer he traveled, the more he thought of who he wanted to share this with, of who he left behind. But he wasn’t ready for that yet. 

He learned so much. There were runes tattooing his body, from different places, and scars painted along his skin like art on it’s own. He befriended werewolves and hunters alike, ran into a coven of vampires and a hunter with a sweet smile showed him how to kill them. His bestiary and catalogue brimmed with information and his sample collection was extensive. He cultivated his Spark the more he spoke with the world’s Deatons. 

He grounded himself in India, studied obsessively in Spain and Italy (trying to forget hazel eyes full of questions), trained in Russia (losing himself in the aches of his body so he doesn’t remember a hand resting just over his heartbeat, taking pain away, but comforting him just as much), and enjoyed Japan with childish wonder (that leaves him aching for his packmates, because they would’ve loved the karaoke and novelty). Egypt was beautiful and Africa was huge and supernatural beings were everywhere. Some were like the ones in France. Some were like the Alphas back in Beacon Hills, vicious and sadistic. Yet, he always made friends wherever he went. 

After a while, he realized the thorns were still embedded in his skin and, for all the fun he was having, he felt the press of them more than ever.

When he landed back in America, scarred and tattooed and exhausted, he didn’t go back home. He went to New York, and remembered the look on Derek’s face when Stiles had thrown himself in front of a wolfsbane bullet meant for him. Things there were nice. Everyone was busy, and there was such a plethora of the supernatural that no one was at odds with each, just simply existed like the humans around them. He partied hard, something he hadn’t done before, feeling more human than ever.

He got a car for saving a group of hunters from a rogue werewolf in North Carolina, and he blasted the radio and loved the smell of the gasoline he’d spilled on his shoes. But the passenger seat was empty, and the nights were long.

He was impressively injured by a shapeshifter in Oklahoma, but he didn’t go to the hospital because he knew they would contact his father and then he’d have to go home. He was avoiding that for a reason. 

He stayed with an elderly lady as he healed, a grey haired, small thing who reminded him of what his mother would’ve been like at that age. She had skilled hands that had sown him shut when he’d appeared, covered in blood, on her doorstep. 

Together they grew a garden and she talked of all the people she had met in her life, and the ones that she’d lost. A werewolf, her husband. She had been scared of loving him because the people that loved her always left, but he hadn’t given up, and when they married it was like they’d always been together, she said. She recalled the pain of losing him with a sad, but fond look on her face, like she was remembering all the best and worst things about loving him. 

“I don’t regret it,” she admitted, “I’ve never regretted any of this life.” Most people he’d talked to said that. The people who shared their stories with him throughout his travels had always looked back with that same nostalgic look on their faces.

“I would give my life for him,” he whispers to her one night after the dishes are done. “I don’t want to lose him.” She turnes to him, that sad smile on her face.

“You’re losing him the longer you run away,” she says, and Stiles asks her to make him lunch for the road. 

He’s jittery and nervous on the way, tapping his thumbs against the steering wheel at every stop light. Soon enough, he’s stopping in front of the police station. He hadn’t contacted his dad as much as he should’ve, opted to send him small postcards instead of calling, because he’d want to come back if he heard his father’s sad voice.

“Can I help you— OH MY GOD!” Erica’s shocked face greets him as he walks in. “Oh my— Stiles? Stiles!” She shrieks, before she rounds the counter to slam into him. “You look— wow! Look at you!”

“Look at me? Look at you! You work here?”

“Oh my gosh, even your voice is different, I’m going to cry,” she wails, and her bottom lip quivers dangerously. Stiles smiles, hugging her close and he can hear her as she sniffs at him delicately. “Oh, shit your dad’s in the office! Go see him!” She pushes at him and he laughs, making his way to his father’s office door and knocking.

“Come in,” his father says, distracted, and Stiles opens the door to see him comparing notes. He stands there, taking in his father’s face. He looks just a bit older, but healthy. He grins, clears his throat until his father glances up in annoyance. But it only takes a moment for his father to push himself up quickly, hands on the desk. 

He’s pulled into a familiar hug, and he enjoys every moment of it, clinging on just as tightly. His father leans back, presses his hands against Stiles’ shoulders so he can look at him. 

“God, look at you,” he whispers in awe, “Your mother would’ve been proud.”

Stiles let himself cry, then. 

After they talk for a while, his father dismisses him so he can get some rest. Stiles agrees, but he doesn’t go to rest. He steels himself as he makes his way to the Hale house. 

He knows Derek can hear someone outside as he turns off his car, drinking in the newly renovated house. It’s beautiful and everything Derek deserves. He shuts the car behind him and makes his way up to the front door, thinking how ridiculous it is that he’s faced down rogue werewolves, shifters, vampires, and sirens, but his heart has never raced this hard before.

The door opens immediately after he knocks, and he holds his breath as he meets Derek’s startled eyes.

“I need to… I need to say something to you,” Stiles says nervously, wringing his hands. He watches Derek body relax just a bit as he nods at Stiles, jaw clenched. 

Stiles swallows, looks away, looks back.

“I have been everywhere,” he starts, watches Derek’s nostrils flare, “I have done so many things and met so many people. I wanted to stay away. It was easy being alone, of running away, and that’s what I was doing, by the way, running. I was running, and the only thing that was constant in my mind, the only thing I could think of before I went to sleep, was how much I would regret not telling you how much I love you.”

“I’m not used to love, Derek, I’m— it scares the ever loving fuck out of me. I’ve been surrounded in a coven of vampires, but it doesn’t compare to how freaking terrified I am right now. I— I… God, I felt so wise and learned just a day ago, Jesus, I—”

He’s cut off by Derek’s lips over his own, Derek’s hands threading through his hair to keep him there, Derek’s body pressing him against the porch banister. He makes an utterly wounded noise in the back of his throat, throwing his arms around Derek’s shoulders and pulling him in tight. They open their mouths to one another, searing and desperate, and the thorns that have coiled so tightly around Stiles heart fall away to ashes in a single moment and nothing has felt so beautiful.

Derek pulls away, keeps his hands cupped on Stiles’ face, foreheads pressing together. 

“You’re an idiot,” Derek says roughly, and Stiles lets out a laugh that sounds like a sob. Derek presses a chaste kiss to his lips, wraps his arms around him. “I missed you.” 


End file.
